


Reach

by elizabethelizabeth



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Notting Hill Fusion, Concerts, Fanfiction of Fanfiction, M/M, Music, Queer Themes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:49:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26201419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elizabethelizabeth/pseuds/elizabethelizabeth
Summary: The crowd at Crowley's solo show is subtle. Obviously, there are people there in their concert finest: t-shirts of other bands, comfortable if expensive-looking shoes, a drink held in every two hands out of three. But the look of the crowd is by no means homogenous: there are people of all walks here, varying in degrees of dress and sobriety and age.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 45
Collections: Choofe Your Faces





	Reach

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lurlur](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lurlur/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Soho](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23578054) by [Lurlur](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lurlur/pseuds/Lurlur). 



> LUR!!!!!! will I ever stop yelling about Soho? PERHAPS NOT!!!!
> 
> this is set mid-chapter 11, specifically after this section
>
>> The audience calmed, the energy muting to match the performance. Aziraphale’s view of the stage became more consistent without the waving arms and bouncing heads of his fellow attendees. Crowley was beautiful, of course, spotlights highlighting the flame-red curls of his hair, the deadly sharpness of his cheekbones, and, _oh,_ the soft expressiveness of his mouth. Aziraphale was so very fucked.
> 
> so, Lur, this is for you because I love The Demons and I love your Crowley and Aziraphale and I love Soho I miss going to concerts and absorbing lyric and sound in that specific kind of liminal space <3 

The crowd at the show is not what Aziraphale expects.

Aziraphale, up to that point, had no discernible opinion of the type of people that listened to The Demons, just a vague amalgamation of rock band stereotypes: men with copycat hairstyles, young ladies crying at the first sign of a lead singer, dressed in black and red and leaning heavily towards more eye makeup than less.

And maybe some of those assumptions are true.

The crowd at Crowley's solo show is subtle, though. Obviously, there are people there in their concert finest: t-shirts of other bands, comfortable if expensive-looking shoes, a drink held in two hands out of three. But the look of the crowd is by no means homogenous: there are people of all walks here, varying in degrees of dress and sobriety and age. Were Aziraphale to interview them all (his brief stint at Velocipede Monthly had left an impact), he’s sure he’d find more and more variance among them: occupation and identity and, perhaps, why they are really here.

> I’m in too deep,
> 
> This falling feeling can’t last
> 
> I’ll need too much,
> 
> We know the patterns of the past

There's a man in a suit, his tie loosened, arms crossed and looking for the world like he'd rather not be there by his countenance, but Aziraphale can see how mesmerized and intently he takes in every lyric. During a song with a particularly catchy chorus, the man mouths along with the words. The bright eyes give him and his admiration away.

> Things seem so dark and cold,
> 
> And I’m lying in the dirt

There's a woman in trainers and jeans, she would not at all have looked out of sorts in a park pushing a pram. She, too, stares at the stage with wonder; eyes bright, smile even more so. She looks at Crowley as if they are old friends, going back decades, and perhaps that is how long these songs have been in her life.

> My hand was there for you to hold,
> 
> Now we’re both just hurt

And, of course, there is a teenager in all black and eyeliner, hair badly dyed a reminiscent shade of red. Barely an adult by Aziraphale's guess, they have their eyes closed and their face tilted ceiling-ward. Skyward. Heaven-ward. a rapture of tones and chords and choruses. There are tear tracks on their cheeks.

> Too far, too fast
> 
> Is there another way to fall?
> 
> Scared of myself
> 
> Because I want it all,
> 
> I want your all.

Aziraphale understood fame; the concept of it. A great many people interested in the work and life of a particular person, intensity ranging anywhere from passive interest to invested knowledge. At the back of Aziraphale's mind, in a dark corner, he'd been wary of the obsessors and fanatics that plagued the heels of Crowley's life. There, in that room, the warmth and weight of adoration wasn't a plague, but a balm. Music to soothe the soul, wasn't that the term? Remedy in rhythm and rhyme. It was the acceptance of representation freely given.

> The best thing I could ever be
> 
> Is whatever you could make of me
> 
> Someone who can listen
> 
> Someone less stubborn
> 
> Is it too late to be
> 
> The me who doesn’t lose you?

Aziraphale walks forward. This song is new. The crowd blurs beside him, but it’s a slow transition. He’s perceptive to a fault, the world in his periphery exists as clear as Crowley’s voice. The details of the crowd come into sharp focus, a prolonged note, a multitude of metaphors as the colors burst and take shape into the symbols and signifiers of what unifies this particular audience.

> Will you still haunt me
> 
> Once I’ve forgotten
> 
> All that it was
> 
> Just to hold your hand?

He has a rainbow pin attached to his loosened collar. She has a bouquet inked in purple, yellow, and blue on her left thigh. They have glitter on their cheekbones and in their hair and on their forearms, catching light twinkling in time with the tempo of Crowley's song. Here and there attached to more fabrics than Aziraphale can name, there are pins featuring proclamations of pronouns. There are flags in the air and wrapped around shoulders, gripped in fingers that have held the hands of friends and lovers, or are lonely in their journey and will someday grasp and be held in return. There is a couple, young, tucked into each other and wrapped so close; they sway and they stare at each other and they smile.

> I’ll take this ugly pity
> 
> Bury it in a hundred songs
> 
> Hope you can hear my sorry
> 
> For each of my many wrongs

What is it, really, to see yourself in someone else? For the quiet and the afraid, for the outspoken and the courageous, for those in between--there is no hierarchy or limit to the merit and meaning of representation. Where Crowley sits on the stage and is unapologetically and only ever Crowley, Aziraphale understands what lies beyond fame and its machinations.

> Is it too late to be
> 
> The me who gets to keep you?

He does it so well, so effortlessly, so beautifully. How difficult it must be to bare one’s soul to crowded bars and rooms and theaters and stadiums, an exponential increase over a lifetime handled with this easy grace of stage presence. His fingers do not shake and his voice does not falter. There was a joke made about the nerves associated with premiering new songs, but there is no nervousness here. Aziraphale can’t stop staring, marvels the smallest amount about how he doesn’t have to. Crowley is beautiful here, is beautiful everywhere. There’s a line about distance and fond hearts in the back of Aziraphale’s mind. Idioms. What are turns of phrase to the reality and truth of this man, this song, this crowd, this unity, and Aziraphale in the middle of it all?

It was never about the fame, but about the reach.

> Is it too late to be
> 
> Yours?

Aziraphale will stretch his hands out and reach back.


End file.
